


Too late to apologize

by lunasenzanotte



Category: Men's Football RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Angst, Dystopia, Guilt, Heavy Angst, Hospitals, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Made-up Disease, Non-Consensual Blood Donation, Virus
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-09
Updated: 2019-05-29
Packaged: 2019-11-14 08:45:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 9,907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18049307
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lunasenzanotte/pseuds/lunasenzanotte
Summary: A new, deadly virus has appeared. The only way to cure it is changing the blood of the person completely for that of an immune person. Which prompts illegal hunters to capture immune people and sell their blood to the rich infected, while the poor have basically no chance to be cured. Toni has the virus, his family decide to pay for the treatment. Things get complicated when Toni realizes the blood also has a face and a name...





	1. One

**Author's Note:**

  * For [furiousflamewolf](https://archiveofourown.org/users/furiousflamewolf/gifts).



> Dedicated to @furiousflamewolf - thank you for entrusting me with your babies, even though you knew I was going to hurt them. I'm not sure it's a "feel better about RM" fic, but it's angst, and angst is always good.

Toni stares at the ceiling. He’s been trying to ignore the muffled sobbing from the other side of the room for good two hours now, eyes fixing the crack in the white paint above his head. He’s determined not to turn his head, not to look. He wishes they had at least put one of those folding screens around his bed. Well, it probably didn’t occur to them. He supposes that people who want to live don’t really care whose blood is going to save them. He shouldn’t care either. It’s his only chance. There is no vaccine against the virus to make people immune to it, no serums or pills to treat it once it enters the body. Changing the blood completely for that of an immune person, of someone lucky enough to be born with the antibody, is the only way.

But of course, there is no blood bank.

It’s not legal, but nobody pursues those who do this. Treating the virus has become some grey zone of the law. This clinic, after all, is not underground, nor hidden in some old storage room, and they don’t use rusty scalpels here. It’s a luxury place with the best equipment, and one of the few that people with the virus leave alive and cured, not in a black plastic bag. Toni figures the government realizes very well that it could happen to any of them at any time, and they would want to have this possibility. They are willing to close their eyes before the people hunting, not to pressure the police to look into the disappearances too much. After all, there are not that many people who could afford the procedure. So far, dying of the virus is the norm, surviving is a privilege of the rich. A privilege Toni will have.

The already familiar rattling sound tears him out of his musings. It’s happening in longer intervals now, as if the person needs more and more time to gather their strength to struggle against the straps tying them to the bed. It’s followed by a louder sob, close to a desperate wail, and Toni screws his eyes shut. It doesn’t help. Not even concentrating on his pain helps now, and it feels like his body betrays him. He could always rely on it to take his mind off other things, but now even the pain refuses to have anything to do with this.

 

_It started in his fingers. He felt tingling first. By morning, he lost the feeling in his fingertips. The next day, he could barely move them. It was immediately clear to him that it wasn’t just a carpal tunnel syndrome, although his doctor was trying to calm him down by offering this diagnosis._

_When the results of the tests came in, he didn’t panic. He still doesn’t know why he didn’t. The doctor read him his death sentence and he didn’t shed a tear._

_“The virus makes the blood thicker,” the doctor explained to him. “It doesn’t flow as well as your body needs it to, and clots easily. The pain is just one of the symptoms, but eventually, what will kill you is most likely embolism. A blood clot that could come loose at any time, blocking an important artery… either stopping your heart or basically giving you a stroke.”_

_Toni just kept looking at him calmly, while his family was apparently in shock. Toni thought that they could have as well expected it. The virus was threatening to become a pandemic now, there was no escape from it. He didn’t know where he contracted it, but he knew exactly how it happened. The damn cut on his finger that he didn’t bother taking care of because it was small and insignificant, and he wasn’t a baby to put a plaster on it. Although the prevention leaflets and TV warned about it all the time. After all, there was a reason why they called it Pestis Punctum, the “stabbed plague”. But no. He knew better. And opened the door for the virus invitingly._

_“There is one way of treating it,” the doctor said then, walking over to the door and locking it. “Our clinic offers it. It consists of a complete blood transfusion. That means, simply said, that we will change the infected blood for one that is virus free, and has the needed antibodies to kill the virus already present.”_

_“You mean that you will change my blood for that of another person’s’,” Toni repeated slowly. “All of it.”_

_“It’s a little bit like chemotherapy,” the doctor explained. “Only that the needed antibodies are already in the blood.”_

_“I understand,” Toni nodded. He did understand the medical side of it. It was the other that worried him._

_“But… the procedure is very expensive,” the doctor lowered his voice. “You know, the research for a synthetic cure is still at the beginning, and the experts have not come up with anything useful yet. This is the only way, and the demand is high. And you understand, it’s not… approved.”_

_Toni was ready to politely decline the offer. He simply knew he couldn’t do it. Couldn’t let someone else pay for his mistake, his stupidity. His family, however, had other ideas._

_“How much?” his father asked._

 

He’s supposed to just wait until they take this person’s blood and pump it in his veins. He doesn’t have to know who it was, he doesn’t have to look in their face, he can just close his eyes before it, both literally and metaphorically. It's what he _should_ do.

No. He is not a coward like that.

Every movement feels like someone is shattering his bones with a hammer, but he manages to sit up. With some effort, he pushes his legs over the edge of the bed and feels the cold floor under his bare feet. That’s a relief. If he still has feeling in his legs, they should be able to support him. The virus has somehow slowed down in the past days, not spreading throughout his body as fast as it used to. The doctors explained it had to do with the blood not flowing as fast as before. The heparin treatment they use to gain time has already stopped working.

Still, he’s breathing hard by the time he reaches the other bed. It’s mere three steps from his own. He leans over the metal frame and then sits on the edge. He takes a deep breath before lifting his eyes and looking in the face of who is going to be his unwilling savior.

The boy can be his age, not much older or younger than him. He’s looking at Toni like a frightened animal. There’s an IV in his arm, probably keeping him hydrated so that the blood flows nicely. It surely doesn’t contain sedatives, since the boy is clearly having a panic attack. He’s shaking and hyperventilating, and Toni is quite sure that if he put a hand on his chest, he could feel his heart beating at a mad speed.

When Toni lifts his hands to his face, he gets the feeling the boy would jump through the ceiling if it wasn’t for the straps keeping him in place.

“Shh,” he whispers, wiping the boy’s tears with his palms, as his fingers are already useless and he can’t even turn his wrists. “Calm down, or you’ll kill yourself before anyone else gets the chance.”

He would slap himself right when the words leave his mouth, but to his surprise, they kind of work. At least the boy stops struggling against the bonds and focuses his eyes on Toni. He’s still breathing too fast, but not sobbing anymore. That’s a relief. Toni feels like he would go mad if he had to listen to one more minute of it.

“I’m sorry,” Toni whispers. “I…”

Well, what is he supposed to say? How is he supposed to apologize? _Sorry, but I will die without your blood. Yeah, I know you need your blood too, but unlike you, I can afford to pay for yours._

He realizes that he doesn’t even know how much they paid for this boy’s blood. Not that knowing it would make him feel any better about it. Probably the contrary. He already feels guilty enough. He felt guilty even before, when his family told him they paid for treatment, as they preferred to call it, and when the doctors explained the procedure to him. But it still didn’t feel real, it was abstract and he focused on his own survival. It sounded like a natural thing to do, a necessary thing to do. They only spoke of the blood, after all, like it didn’t belong to anyone. Now reality kicks in. Seeing the boy strapped to the bed with duct tape over his mouth makes it all but natural, and he starts to doubt it’s necessary.

It’s almost like a game. Keep your eyes closed until it’s over, and you win. He’s already lost, and he knows it.

“Keep still,” he says, and tries to make use at least of his thumb to peel off a piece of the duct tape.

It’s a painstaking process that takes him several minutes, and finally the boy helps him by jerking his head in the opposite direction. He takes a gasping breath, like he can finally take in enough air to keep himself alive.

Toni bites his lip. He should say something. At least he thinks that talking to people with panic attacks is good.

“I…” he starts, and tries to think of something not entirely stupid he could say. “I’m Toni.”

The boy sniffles. “Hi,” he whispers.

“And you are?” Straight to hell, indeed. If there was a tiny speck of hope that he would be able to do this, he’s just lost it.

“Lucas.”

Toni attempts a smile, trying his best to calm the boy down at least a little bit. His own mind is racing and he feels like he’s not far from a panic attack himself.

Lucas looks at Toni’s still fingers and his stiff posture. “You… you have the thing, right?” he asks, and his voice is shaking. “The virus.”

Toni nods. He expects Lucas to panic completely now, but he looks like it rather calms him down. Perhaps knowing the truth is better than imagining things.

“So… you paid for my blood, is that right?”

“I didn’t,” Toni says. “My family did.”

Lucas chuckles humorlessly. “I guess it doesn’t make a difference.”

“No,” Toni whispers. He indeed doesn’t feel less guilty. He could have stopped them, after all. He still _can_ stop them. “I can tell them I don’t want it,” he says before he can really think about it. “They can’t pump your blood in my veins if I don’t want it.”

“They can still pump it in someone else’s veins,” Lucas says. “I think it’s in high demand now.”

Well, he has a point. If it’s not Toni, it will be someone else with the same blood group.

“Does it… are you in pain?” Lucas asks, mistaking Toni’s wince for one of physical pain.

“Yes,” Toni says truthfully. “But it’s… bearable.”

“How much time do you have?”

Toni can hear the true meaning behind the question. _How much time do_ I _have?_ It still feels surreal, Lucas asking about _his_ pain, _his_ life, like it is more important. Just because his family has the money. “I don’t know,” he whispers. “But not much. It’s slowed down a little, but a blood clot could kill me any time.”

Lucas takes a breath, but the sound of the automatic door opening interrupts him. Toni’s doctor walks in, accompanied by one of the nurses. Seeing Toni sitting on the edge of Lucas’ bed makes them stop in their tracks, the door attempting to close several time in vain.

“What…” the doctor finally says and moves to let the door close. “You cannot…”

“I wanted to know whose blood I was going to get,” Toni says. “I thought I should know it.”

The doctor sighs. “You don’t need to worry, we have his medical records, there’s nothing to worry about,” he says.

“I don’t think so," Toni barks. “He’s got a fever.”

He’s not lying, after all. Lucas’s forehead is much warmer to the touch than it should be. Toni knows they’re probably just nerves, but it can still buy him some time to think about a better plan. Any plan at all, actually.

The doctor frowns and approaches the bed while a nurse helps Toni get back to his, giving him a scolding, talking about the blood clots and risks and all, but he doesn’t even listen. He’s already dead anyway, because there is no way he is going to let them give him Lucas’ blood. He only needs enough time to figure out how to save him. And time is just what he doesn’t have.

In one of the brief moments in which the doctors and nurses aren’t fretting over him, Lucas turns his head and looks at him. Toni winks. Lucas smiles.

Then a white coat comes into view and Toni closes his eyes. He will figure it out. He just needs time. Just a bit of time…

He falls asleep before managing to even start thinking about it, his body betraying him once again.


	2. Two

_He hoped it was just a regular robbery. Now that he thinks back, he was really naive to think that, and it also makes him ask what the world has come to when a robbery doesn’t seem like a bad thing at all. But he doesn’t look like someone people would want to rob on the street, simply because it’s quite obvious he doesn’t have anything valuable - except his blood. They must have known, they must have been sent directly to take him. After all, he did have his blood tests merely a week before they got him. Doctors will take any money the hunters may offer them these days, and will gladly provide them with names and medical records. The hunters will still make enough, and the clinics will make enough even with paying the hunters, because rich people will pay any price to be cured. Like this boy’s family._

_But maybe it’s also his fault. He should have been more careful. Especially after they told him he was immune to the virus. He had heard about the mysterious disappearances, mainly of poor people nobody would really miss. Like him. But it sounded a bit like an urban legend to him. How could people just disappear? How could anyone simply steal someone’s blood? Even when he heard a click and felt the cold press of a gun edged against his head, an arm snaked quickly around his torso before he could turn around, that scenario didn’t cross his mind. They were in the middle of a parking lot, it wasn’t even that empty. It was early afternoon. How could such things happen in broad daylight?_

_Someone threw a black cape over his head and zip-tied his wrists behind his back. They threw him in the back of a van and he heard the whooshing sound of the door being shut. It took mere seconds, and if anyone saw anything, they did a great job of pretending they didn’t. He should have figured it out then. Maybe he would have fought more._

_But the naive fool that he was, he only realized it when he found himself strapped to this bed._

 

The soft rustle from the bed next to him makes him turn his head.

“You sleep like a baby,” he says.

Toni looks at him in confusion, blinking with bleary eyes. “What?”

“I say you sleep like a baby. I thought you’d never wake up again.”

Toni slept through the doctors fussing over Lucas, discussing all the possible reasons for him having a fever, taking another blood sample to run some more tests just in case, and generally talking about Lucas like he wasn’t even there, or more precisely, like he was already dead.

Toni makes a face. “Or you hoped I wouldn’t.”

Lucas rolls his eyes. “I told you it wouldn’t help me anyway, they’d give my blood to someone else,” he says. “No, I… was kind of lonely here.”

Toni frowns. “Lonely?” he repeats incredulously. Probably in his opinion, the last thing that should worry Lucas is being lonely.

“It’s better when I can talk to someone,” Lucas says. “I feel less like I’m… a pig waiting for slaughter.”

Toni tries to sit up. It seems to take more time and effort than before. Like the hours of sleep didn’t give him any strength at all.

“You shouldn’t…” Lucas starts, but Toni is already dragging his body across the room. Lucas notices that he’s limping. It seems like he’s losing feeling in his legs, too.

“How is your fever?” he asks when he sits on the edge of Lucas’ bed.

Lucas looks at him. “Better, I guess. They couldn’t give me anything for it except a cold rag on my forehead, though.”

“Why?”

“Because my blood needs to be completely pure before it becomes yours,” Lucas says.

Toni gulps. “I…” he starts. “I don’t want this.”

Lucas smiles sadly. “What? To live?”

“No, I…” Toni looks at him, and suddenly he looks lost. Like he realizes that there is no way out, no way they could both live. No happy ending. “I don’t want to live knowing that I killed you. It’s not fair.”

“You don’t have feeling in your hands,” Lucas states.

“No,” Toni says, blinking in confusion at the sudden change of topic. “That’s where it started.”

“Yeah, I figured,” Lucas smiles.

Toni looks down and gasps when he sees Lucas’ hand holding his, but he doesn’t pull back. Lucas runs his thumb over the back of Toni’s hand, even though he knows Toni can’t feel it. “I think we just both need to accept it like it is,” he says. “I’m going to die. You’re going to live.”

He watches in awe as Toni’s eyes fill with tears. “I’m sorry,” he whispers. “I’m so sorry.”

Lucas closes his eyes because they too are starting to sting, and he just doesn’t want to cry anymore. He wants to be brave about this, he just doesn’t know how.

He opens his eyes again when he feels Toni pulling his hand from his grasp. “I’m tired,” Toni says and gets up. “I should-“

The next moment, he’s on the floor, crumpled like an unstrung puppet.

“Toni!” Lucas gasps. “Toni!”

There is the alarm next to Toni’s bed, but not next to his, obviously.

He resorts to screaming.

The nurse does run in, together with a security guard, who promptly leaves the room when he sees Toni on the floor. Either he figures he is not needed there, or he runs to get a doctor.

Lucas is still screaming.

The nurse gets Toni in a safer position and checks his pulse when the doctor runs in. “What happened?” he asks.

Lucas isn’t sure if he’s asking him or the nurse. “He said he was tired, got up and collapsed,” he says.

The doctor gives him a quick look before turning his attention back to Toni. Two medics move him back on the bed and the nurse quickly puts the IV back in his vein.

“Get him more heparin,” the doctor says. “And start with the blood taking. We can’t wait any longer.”

 

Lucas barely notices what is going on, doesn’t watch the preparations, just listens to the quiet sounds of the machines around Toni’s bed. He only comes to his senses when the needle goes in. Then he watches the blood run through the tube like a snake, starting to fill the bag.

“Is it really going to save him?” he asks, turning his head to look at Toni. It’s not even like he needs to know that he’s not going to die in vain. He wants to know if it’s not too late.

The nurse looks at him with suspicion. “The doctors know what they are doing,” she says, and without a doubt it’s a phrase she’s memorized. She also leaves promptly. Without a doubt she’s also instructed not to talk to him more than absolutely necessary.

Lucas looks at the ceiling until the nurse comes back. She grabs the bag and exchanges it for an empty one. If this was a normal blood donation, she would stop now. But of course one bag won’t solve anything. He wouldn’t be here if it could.

He fights another panic attack that’s threatening to engulf him. _There’s nothing you can do_ , he tells himself. _Don’t make them happy. Just go with it._

“You might start to feel cold or tired,” the nurse says. “It’s normal.”

The blood is still running. He can’t look at the ceiling anymore. It makes him feel dizzy. He closes his eyes instead. But darkness scares him. Minutes tick by. His heart is beating faster.

She comes back. Changes the bag.

He’s breathing faster. Tears are streaming down his cheeks. He doesn’t give a damn about being brave anymore.

“Stop,” he hears himself whisper. “Please, stop.”

The blood flows. He’s breathing too fast, and it doesn’t seem to be enough to fill his lungs. He doesn’t want to die.

His body feels strangely light, like he could fly. But he doesn’t want to fly. He just wants to sleep.

He turns his head to the side, looking at Toni, and makes himself as comfortable as he possibly can. Giving in suddenly feels better than resisting.


	3. Three

When Toni wakes up, his neck feels itchy and he scratches the spot, sighing with relief. Then he realizes that something is not right. He moved his fingers. He shouldn’t be able to move his fingers.

He looks above his head, and feels his heart skip a beat. There are two blood bags hanging on the IV stand, one of them nearly empty.

“Lucas!” he whispers, scrambling up on his elbows and looking to the other side of the room.

Lucas’ head is turned towards him, but his eyes are closed and even in the dim light, Toni can see how pale he is.

Toni tries to move his legs, but the metal side of the bed is up, probably to prevent him from rolling over, and he’s not yet strong enough to move it with one hand. The other has the IV still pumping Lucas’ blood in his veins. He resists the urge to rip it out. Not like it would help anything.

He grabs the plastic box on the side of the bed and rings the bell.

The nurse turns up promptly. She checks the IV and his arm briefly, and says that she will get him a doctor. Toni waits, sitting up and alert like a guarding dog. The doctor comes in mere minutes later.

“Good to see you feeling so well,” he smiles like he’s proud of himself. “I’m told you can move your fingers now, that’s wonderful. Some physiotherapy might be necessary afterwards, but we’ll worry about that later.”

“What… why did you…” Toni starts and looks on when the nurse changes the bag above his head. He doesn’t remember how this happened. He doesn’t remember much. Lucas touching his hand and him not feeling anything. Crying, maybe. Then nothing.

“We needed to start with the transfusion sooner than we expected,” the doctor explains. “Your organs would start to fail if we didn’t.”

“How much have you given me already?” Toni asks, and then regrets it immediately. Maybe he doesn’t really want to know.

“This is the third dose,” the doctor says like it’s no big deal. Toni feels his head spin. Three blood bags. No wonder that Lucas looks the way he does. “And the last for now.”

“For now?” Toni frowns.

“We need to wait,” the doctor explains. “The antibodies need to do their work first. We need to run a few tests and see how it’s going. If it’s doing what it’s supposed to do. But judging from the fact that your body seems to regain its functions, we’re on a good way.”

He doesn’t speak a word about Lucas, not even when Toni keeps glancing towards the other bed. Still, Lucas seems to be taken better care of now. At least it looks like they are monitoring him, there’s an IV giving him fluids, and there is also a blanket over his body keeping him warm. Toni doesn’t know if it’s a good or a bad thing.

“How is he doing?” he asks.

Luckily, it sounds to the doctor more like he cares about his personal blood bank, and in their logic, it’s probably understandable. “The blood replaces itself, but we were kind of worried… usually, the body doesn’t react this way after taking this amount of blood…”

“What way?”

“To say it simply, it… kind of started to shut down,” the doctor says and scratches his head.

“Is that why you didn’t take more?” Toni looks at him, and the doctor almost squirms under his gaze.

“We need to do it gradually anyway, there’s no need to worry,” he says, but Toni doesn’t believe a word he says. He doesn’t trust anyone anymore.

“Move his bed over here,” he says.

The doctor and the nurse exchange worried looks, probably wondering if Toni has gone mad or if the transfusion is messing with his brain.

“I’m not sure if it’s a good idea,” the doctor says. “It’s not a standard request, and…”

“I think my family pays enough for you to to give me what I want!” Toni snaps and almost cringes. He _can_ sound bossy when he tries. He had no idea.

“We just want to say that you should focus on your own recovery,” the nurse tries to appease him.

“I think I need him very much for my own recovery,” Toni retorts.

They stop arguing with him after that. He’s got the strong feeling that things are not going the way they are supposed to, and they are afraid of Toni’s family suing them, or at least trashing them publicly, in case the procedure is too shady for a legal process to be applicable.

He waits until everyone leaves the room, then reaches through the metal bars of the barriers around his and Lucas’ beds.

“Lucas,” he whispers and touches his face. His skin feels cold and clammy, and his face doesn’t look like the face of someone who is sleeping peacefully. There’s some strange kind of anguish on it, and every second Toni spends looking at it physically hurts him. He keeps looking at it. He feels like he deserves the pain.

“I promise I’ll find a way to help you,” he whispers. “But you have to get better, I can’t do this alone, I…”

He pauses, realizing that he’s basically talking to himself. He starts to understand what Lucas meant about being lonely. He’s afraid, and being alone with the fear is excruciating.

“You’re stronger than that!” he says and takes Lucas’ hand, entwining the still fingers with his own as well as he can. His fingers still feel clumsy and stiff, but he has the feeling in them now, he can tell what is warm and what is cold. His tears, warm. Lucas’ fingers, cold.

His eyes fall at the cart the nurse left there probably when she was drawing the blood. Maybe she thought it was redundant to take it out when she would need it again.

Toni pushes himself up, then reaches over Lucas’ body and carefully pulls it closer, praying that he doesn’t overturn the whole thing. He’s not sure about what he’s doing. Something is simply telling him to do it, and he has no better plan.

Then he sees it. The bottle of disinfectant. Just a regular one, but Toni remembers the name on the label, and he knows that this is his chance. He grabs it and hides it in the drawer of his bedside table before carefully pushing the cart back.

He hovers over Lucas’ body for a moment. The thought of kissing him crosses his mind, but then he remembers that this is not a fairy-tale, Lucas is not the Sleeping Beauty and he is no prince, and he shouldn’t kiss people who are not able to express their consent to it. He settles back on his bed and takes Lucas’ hand again. It makes him feel a little bit less lonely.


	4. Four

Lucas can hear things much sooner than he can open his eyes or move, or speak. His eyelids weight a ton and he feels like he will never have the strength to open them again. He couldn’t move around much even before, so he’s not too worried about that.

But he hears things, first just sounds, muted, like they are coming from another room, or rather another floor, muffled by several walls. Beeping and humming of a ventilator, and someone talking to him. Steps, voices, door opening and closing, and someone talking to him again.

And he feels. Mostly cold, he thinks that he must be shivering. He feels the pain in his muscles, and warmth in his palm that he can’t quite explain to himself.

Everything gets sharper gradually. Now the beeping sounds so loud it’s giving him headache, and he feels too cold, and he wants someone to do something about it. He tries to say something, and doesn’t even know what, but it doesn’t matter. His voice doesn’t quite cooperate and he realizes that it comes out as an inarticulate sound. What comes in response is definitely his name, and a warm hand on his face.

_Toni._

He gathers all the strength he has left and opens his eyes. The world is blurry for a while, but then he manages to focus his eyes on the face above him.

Toni looks… worried. Genuinely worried. Not the kind of worried he looked when he first talked to him. Not like he’s concerned about his own health and salvation, but like he cares about Lucas.

“Are you… are you in pain?” he asks, untangling his fingers from where they are linked with Lucas’. _The warmth in his palm._

Lucas does his best to shake his head, but it kind of just lolls to the side and stays there, and he doesn’t have the strength to move again. “Cold,” he breathes out.

Toni pulls another blanket out of somewhere, and covers him with it, tucking it carefully around his body.

“It’s okay, you’re going to be okay,” he whispers and caresses his face again.

Before he falls asleep again, for a fraction of second, like a complete fool, Lucas believes him.

 

***

 

Toni keeps watching Lucas for long hours after he falls asleep again. He feels mildly relieved, just because Lucas isn’t dead and doesn’t look like he’s about to die anymore. But he feels more and more guilty, because he is obviously suffering because of him, and because he hasn’t thought of any good plan how to make it stop.

Except ignoring the familiar tingling in his toes.

If he tells the doctors, they will give him more of Lucas’ blood. And Toni is no expert, but he thinks that Lucas now needs the blood way more than he does.

His body will have to cope with the virus on its own. He just hopes it doesn’t kill him before he thinks of a way to save Lucas.

He tucks the blanket around Lucas’ body as much as the straps allow him too. He doesn’t think that Lucas would be able to run away now, but as long as the staff feel safe, they will not move Lucas to another room or start monitoring this one too closely.

Lucas moves from time to time, or makes a quiet, discontent sound, but doesn’t wake up. Toni still sits up every time and watches him until he calms down.

When it gets dark outside, the nurse pokes her head inside, asking if everything is all right. Toni smiles and nods. The nurse closes the door again.

Toni tries to move his toes. They don’t budge.

 

***

 

Lucas thinks that he must have slept for years. He has faint memories of waking up several times, always for a moment, and he remembers Toni saying something, and covering him with another blanket, and once he thinks a doctor or a nurse was checking on him. But he always fell asleep again, right away, like his body didn’t have enough.

This time is the first time he can keep his eyes open for more than a couple seconds. He turns his head and looks at Toni.

“You’re still alive,” he smiles.

“So are you,” Toni says.

Lucas nods. “For how long, though?”

Toni doesn’t answer. Lucas closes his eyes and takes a deep breath.

“Why can’t they at least do it quickly?” he sobs.

Toni just takes his hand and holds it. It somehow feels better than if he were promising him things that aren’t likely to happen. Promising him salvation.

“Do you like the mountains?” Toni asks.

Lucas looks at him like Toni’s just gone mad. “What?”

“If you like the mountains.”

Lucas frowns. “I… I guess?”

“I have a house in Guadarrama,” Toni says. “More like a weekend cottage, but…”

Lucas has absolutely no idea why Toni is telling him about his weekend cottage in the mountains, really, but he doesn’t even think of stopping him. It’s nice to listen to someone speaking about something else than blood and death. It’s nice to imagine this house, even if he’s never going to see it. And Toni can describe really well, actually. Lucas feels like he can see the house and the garden, like he could find it so easily, like they are walking through it together.

“You should go there,” Lucas says after a moment of silence. “When you’re cured, you know.”

“What if I don’t want to be cured?” Toni whispers.

Lucas chuckles. “Nonsense.”

“Not at this cost,” Toni says. “Nobody should be cured at this cost.”

“But it’s the only way,” Lucas says.

“Then there should be no way at all. This has to end,” Tonis says firmly. “This is wrong, it has to end.”

“I don’t think people will ever stop doing it,” Lucas sighs. “It’s natural that you want to save yourself, no matter what it takes. Just you are… weird.”

Toni laughs. “The good kind of weird, I hope.”

“Yeah. The best kind.”

 

***

 

Toni is almost asleep when two men in scrubs enter the room. He doesn’t even have time to let go of Lucas’ hand before they walk up right to them.

They move Lucas’ bed so fast that Toni’s wrist hits the metal side. The pain finally tears him out of his stupor.

“What are you doing?” he shouts. “Where are you taking him?”

The men don’t answer, they act like they can’t hear him. Lucas looks at him, eyes wide and scared. Toni wants to jump out of bed and stop them, but he’s tangled in too many tubes and electrodes, and abrupt movements are still not a good idea, as his head informs him when it starts to spin.

When he opens his eyes again, there’s the doctor standing at the doorstep.

“I will explain everything to you,” he says and closes the door. “But I don’t have good news.”


	5. Five

The men don’t speak a word all the way to the elevator. It’s late at night, the corridors are empty, it’s… wrong.

_This is it_ , Lucas thinks. _This is the end. They’ll suck the rest of my blood and throw me… wherever. To the morgue. Or cremate me. Or something else. It won’t really matter to me then anyway._

The men have slapped a piece of duct tape over his mouth as soon as they left the room. He supposes they waited with it not to unnerve Toni too much, although he thinks that Toni is raising hell right now. He kind of hopes that he is.

The elevator goes up, that’s all he knows from the light going up next to the numbers, but nothing tells him what is in fourth floor where the elevator finally stops. It looks like another corridor. All of them look similar, after all. Cold and empty.

The room they take him to also doesn’t look much different from the one they share with Toni, except there is a machine that he doesn’t remember. The procedure looks similar to the previous one, though, and he’s actually surprised at how he’s handling it. 

It’s not the best he’s ever felt, but he doesn’t lose consciousness even for a minute. He doesn’t even feel like his heart is about to jump out of his ribcage. The procedure doesn’t take more than half an hour, and then the men who brought him in take him back to his room.

Toni is staring at the ceiling, not looking like he is about to raise hell at all, and he almost doesn’t acknowledge Lucas’ presence even after they are left alone. Not that Toni is the most talkative person, but after a while, it really starts to become worrying.

“Are you okay?” Lucas asks.

Toni chuckles humorlessly. “Funny that it’s you asking,” he says, but sits up with some effort.

“I’m more okay than I thought I would be,” Lucas says. “I… I thought…”

“They just took plasma,” Toni says flatly. “The machine separated it and returned the rest of your blood, like red cells, back to your body. You need them more than I do now.”

Lucas just blinks. “And… that’s it?”

“For now,” Toni says. “That’s what they think.”

“That’s what they think?” Lucas frowns. “What do you mean?”

Toni sighs and lays his head back on the pillow. “You should get some sleep,” he says. “You’re going to need it.”

“Where? In my grave?” Lucas asks, and Toni actually laughs.

“That’s not what I meant.”

 

* * *

 

When Lucas wakes up, there’s another IV bag above Toni’s bed, almost empty.

“So are you completely cured yet?” Lucas asks, turning his head to look at Toni.

“Nope. Your plasma is truly no miracle,” Toni answers in the same tone of voice, and chuckles. “Do something about it, man.”

The nurse comes in and removes the empty bag. “We will do the tests later today,” she says.

“Thank you,” Toni nods.

As soon as she walks out, he sits up, opens the drawer of his nightstand and pulls out a glass bottle. Then he makes the two steps to sit on the edge of Lucas’ bed.

“What is this?” Lucas asks.

“Disinfectant,” Toni says calmly.

“And… what… are you doing with it?” Lucas asks, watching Toni smear the disinfectant around the area where the IV is usually attached to his arm, and then wipe it off with a tissue.

“Trust me,” Toni says, running his fingers lightly over Lucas’ wrist, right where the strap ends, and squeezes his hand.

“I trust you,” Lucas whispers.

Toni tucks the bottle and the tissue between the mattress and the frame of the bed, and smiles. Lucas has no idea about what is going on.

“Toni, you…” he says then, as a rash starts to appear on Toni’s arm, raised bumps and red dots.

“Don’t move,” Toni whispers and sits on his own bed, pushing the button to call the nurse. “Whatever happens, don’t move until I’m gone.”

Lucas is kind of starting to fear the virus has decided to eat through Toni’s brain, although from what he knows about the virus, it’s not supposed to do that. “What on…”

He doesn’t get to finish his sentence, because the nurse pokes her head in. “What’s happening?” she asks.

Toni looks so dumbfounded that if Lucas hadn’t seen him putting something he’s apparently allergic to on his own skin before, he would totally buy into this act. “I… have this…” he says and shows his arm to the nurse.

She takes a closer look, and there’s worry written all over her face. “Wait a moment,” she says. “I’m going to call someone to take you to the doctor’s office, we need to assess this.”

“Just take me there yourself,” Toni objects. “I can still sit in the chair.”

The nurse nods and goes to retrieve the wheelchair from the corner of the room. Lucas just stares at Toni, feeling his heart sink when Toni practically drops onto chair. He is definitely not okay, and the allergic reaction has nothing to do with it.

He keeps looking at the door long after Toni is gone. Then he shuffles on the bed, and realizes what this was all about.

The buckle of the strap around his right wrist is undone. When he moves his hand, the strap falls right off.

To his surprise, the first instinct is to just ignore it. To just stay still, because this only means trouble. Then his hand flies to the strap across his chest, and he makes quick work of the one around his left wrist.

He gets up carefully, and the first steps are all wobbly and almost painful, as his body is all stiff and sore. He prays to God not to fall and knock anything down, because he definitely doesn’t want to alarm anybody. He peeks out of the door carefully. The corridor is quiet and empty, and the reception is abandoned as well. Without a doubt the nurse who is on duty is the same nurse that went to escort Toni to the doctor.

The virus definitely didn’t affect Toni’s brain at all.

Lucas still convinced that he will collapse in the middle of the corridor or something, because his body is asking him if he’s gone mad. He’s out of breath when he gets to the elevator, and he more falls than walks in.

The elevator is empty. He looks at the buttons. None of the floors seem to be a good idea, especially not the ground floor, since he guesses it’s where people exit and enter the hospital. The negative numbers look the most appealing. He smashes -2, and leans against the wall. The long seconds the elevator moves he just prays for nobody to need it and stop it somewhere in the middle. But the little dart showing the way just keeps getting lower, and then the door opens with a quiet “ding”.

He’s in what looks like the hospital’s basement, a long, dark corridor lit by light tubes. He comes across a couple of hospital beds that are probably stored there for the lack of space, and some chairs and tables that look broken. The couple of doors he encounters are locked, and labeled with words and symbols that promise no escape route.

Finally, he comes across a bigger door with no labels on it. He pushes the door - actually, he more leans all his weight against it until it opens. The room is dim, but he immediately knows where he is. He can smell washing liquid and soap, and the air is warm and humid. Laundry room.

He resists the temptation to just plop down onto one of the piles of laundry and take a nap on it, and looks for a good hiding place since he doesn’t want to stand in the middle of the room in case someone walks in.

After a moment, he decides on a small space behind the big washing machines. He doesn’t think he will be able to stay there for long, but he needs to at least think of some plan. Maybe at night, it will be easier to get out of the building at the ground level. Or he will find another way out. Or, actually, they will find him here, because if they haven’t found out he is missing yet, then they must notice any second.

Suddenly, there is a loud screeching sound. Lucas presses himself behind the washing machine as much as possible and glances to the door, but it stays closed. On the contrary, there is a breeze of cold air, and daylight filling the room. The two men that walk in don’t seem to be looking for him, too. They are not in a hurry at all, and they keep chatting between themselves, not bothering to even look around the room.

Lucas watches them throw two full bags of sheets on the ground and walk out. After a while, he dares to crawl out of his hiding place and peek outside. The men are standing some twenty steps away next to one of the metal ashtrays, smoking. The back door of the van is open.

There are still about five steps between the door and the van, five steps when he will be in the open.

Screw it. He has nothing to lose.

He crosses the space and hops in as quietly as possible. As nobody starts to shout, they probably didn’t notice him.

He quickly assesses the contents of the van, and figures that hiding behind the bags the furthest from the door will be the safest option. Then he just has to wait for the van to stop again, and jump out at the right moment.

There is a metal screech again, and a swooshing sound as the van door closes. When the engine starts, Lucas finally allows himself to collapse on the bags of dirty laundry and start to cry.


	6. Six

Lucas waits for his opportunity to jump out of the van for two more stops. Then the two men decide that it’s time for another cigarette break, and he manages to sneak out without them noticing.

It’s almost dark outside now. Lucas guesses that they are still in the complex of the clinic, because the buildings around look like a hospital to him. But there is no fence or wall around them, just roads for the emergency cars, and the only thing separating him from freedom is a bar next to a booth. Which would be a problem if he was driving a car, but definitely not now.

He peeks inside the booth, where an elderly man is watching a small TV. A football match is on, and since Lucas is not a car making noise, when he ducks under the bar, the man doesn’t even notice him.

He is on the street now, somewhere. He considers his options. He doesn’t know where he is, he has no money nor documents on him, and if he stays where he is now, there is a high chance his freedom will not last long.

Toni definitely meant well, but he could have at least told him where to go once he would be out.

_Wait._

He remembers the talk about Toni’s house in Guadarrama, and suddenly it makes sense to him. Maybe he’s imagining things, but he somehow knows it wasn’t a random thing to talk about to calm Lucas down, it had a purpose.

He plasters himself to the wall of one building, hiding in the shadows, trying to figure out what to do. For a moment, his mind flies to Toni and he wonders if they already know he’s gone. Well, they must have found out by now. He wonders if they are raising alarm now and looking for him, but since what they are doing is illegal in essence, they are probably forced to do it discreetly. They probably also know that someone had to help Lucas. Toni is the obvious option. Lucas hopes they are not going to harm him. Although it might not make a difference, since without his blood, Toni is pretty much doomed anyway.

A small part of him suddenly wants to go back. The more reasonable part, luckily, is strong enough to tell him otherwise.

He follows the road in the opposite direction of the clinic, until it takes him off the street to where more cars are passing by. Hitchhiking seems to be the fastest option, and paradoxically also the safest one. At least until he realizes that every car and van looks suspicious to him now. For his panicked and paranoid brain, any of them could belong to the people from the clinic, or the people they - again in his brain’s scenarios - sent to hunt him down and bring back.

He stands on the side of the road like an idiot for a good half an hour until he sees a truck approaching, and somehow, he reasons with himself that the truck is the safest option there is. Surely no one would hunt him down in a truck made for delivering Sevillan oranges.

Lucas raises his hand and prays for a miracle.

It happens.

The truck passes him by, but slows down, the back lights lit. Lucas dares to run a little, despite his body telling him it’s not a good idea. He just doesn’t want the driver to change his mind.

The door is already open when he reaches the truck. He climbs in with some effort.

“Hi,” he says. “And thanks.”

“No problem,” the driver says. “Where are you going?”

“Guadarrama,” Lucas says. “Well, as close as you can take me.”

The driver nods. “I’m Sergio, by the way,” he says.

“Lucas,” Lucas mumbles.

The cabin is uncomfortably silent for a while. Sergio shoots a side glance at Lucas a couple times before he snaps.

“If you don’t stop looking at me like I’m about to murder you, I might actually do it,” he says. “Or kick you out, because I’m not a fan of murdering people.”

Lucas smiles. “Sorry. I’ve… had a rough day. A couple of them, actually.”

“Yeah, you do look like you’re running from some crazy Ninjas or something,” Sergio says.

“Not exactly Ninjas, but yeah,” Lucas sighs. “I guess you might have saved my life.”

Sergio grins. “Nice to know that. I’d appreciate if you didn’t tell anyone I took you in, though,” he says. “We’re not supposed to take people, you know. My boss would kill me.”

“Why did you stop, then?” Lucas asks.

“My radio’s broken and I’m bored,” Sergio says like it’s obvious.

“And why can’t you take people?” Lucas asks.

“Rules, regulations…” Sergio mutters. “We had it even before, but everyone did it from time to time. Now almost no one does it, and I shouldn’t do it either, but screw it.”

“Why?”

“Because you could have the virus, dumbass!” Sergio looks at him like Lucas is an idiot, and Lucas notices the band-aid on one of his fingers, carefully put on.

“I don’t have the virus,” Lucas says.

“How the fuck do you know?” Sergio laughs. “No one knows, unless they are-“ He pauses and looks at Lucas like he’s just seen a ghost. “Oh fuck.”

“Yeah.”

“Shit.”

For a while, Sergio seems to be overwhelmed by sharing the cabin with an immune person. But he’s too talkative to be silent for long.

“The fucking virus is getting on my nerves, though. They should finally find a cure for it, dammit.”

“I think it won’t happen overnight,” Lucas shrugs.

“But it should happen before it seriously fucks the world up. It’s already changed everything. There are all these controls and quarantines and stuff now,” Sergio growls. “Before, you grabbed a crate of oranges and threw it out there, but now - specific crates, everything labeled, papers, papers, everything disinfected twenty times…”

“It’s already fucked the world up, man,” Lucas sighs. “If it didn’t, they wouldn’t be hunting people down to give their blood to other people just because the infected person can afford to pay for it.”

“Are they seriously doing that?” Sergio turns to him.

“I didn’t believe it either, and maybe if I did, I wouldn’t be missing some blood right now.”

“So this is what you are running from,” Sergio says incredulously. “Shit.”

“Yeah.”

The cabin is silent again for some time, until Sergio pulls up at a gas station. Lucas tenses, because he doesn’t know what’s going on. Sergio just tells him to wait and jumps down and disappears. Lucas considers doing the same, but quite frankly, he doesn’t think he’d get too far. His body feels heavy, as though he’s already used up all strength he had left. All he wants is to curl up somewhere and sleep for days.

Then Sergio reemerges from the small shop that belongs to the gas station, climbs back in the cabin and hands Lucas a cup of coffee and a paper bag. Lucas just stares at him.

“I thought you must be hungry,” Sergio says somehow sheepishly. “There are biscuits, and chocolate, and stuff with sugar. I donated blood once, they said you were supposed to eat sugar.”

To be fair, if Lucas was to eat all the food, he’d probably get diabetes, but he really appreciates Sergio’s concern. And truth to be told, he is hungry. The clinic didn’t care much about him being hungry. Apparently, hunger didn’t affect the quality of the blood, so why should they?

“Thanks,” he says and sips on the coffee. He’s not sure what it’s going to do with his organism, but it’s hot and sweet and he doesn’t even care anymore. “So where are you taking me?”

“To Guadarrama,” Sergio says.

Lucas blinks. “Wait, were you really heading there?”

“No, but I’m taking you there,” Sergio says resolutely.

“What about your boss?” Lucas asks.

“He can fuck off,” Sergio says. “I’m fed up with oranges anyway.”

 

 

Toni’s description was so accurate that they find the house without any problems. Sergio leaves the lights on and stays there just in case something goes amiss, but Lucas just _feels_ that this is the right house.

His heart is beating madly in his chest when he bends down and lifts the giant flower pot containing a plant he’s not able to identify.

The key is there, just as Toni said it would be.

Lucas unlocks the door and waves to Sergio. He listens to the sound of the engine slowly growing distant and only then walks in.

Switching the lights on is probably risky, but he needs to see where he is, and after all, it didn’t seem to him that the houses around had people in them. He feels for the switch and then presses it. Warm light illuminates the small hallway. The house looks exactly as he imagined it. It’s small, but cosy. Well, he wouldn’t really care even if it was a ruin without electricity.

He finds a sofa in the biggest room there is, and as he doesn’t feel comfortable sniffing around the house too much, he just switches off the light and curls up in it. He falls asleep almost immediately.

 

 

A ringing sound startles him so much that the knocks something off as he jumps out of the sofa. It’s already day outside. He looks around the room blearily until he locates the source of the sound. It’s a telephone on the small table by the window, a landline.

He lets the phone ring. It stops after seven or eight rings. Lucas lets out a breath of relief.

A minute later, the phone starts to ring again. This cannot be a coincidence.

Lucas creeps to the phone and picks up the receiver.

“Hello?”

“I see you’ve found it,” Toni’s voice says.

“Yes,” Lucas whispers. “I… thank you. For saving me.”

“I was just wondering if you would… if I could… see you again,” Toni says. “If you don’t want to, or don’t trust me… and I would understand that… then I’ll leave you alone, but I wanted…”

“Of course I want to see you again, stupid,” Lucas chuckles. “You saved my life and let me inside your house, why wouldn’t I trust you?”

“Good,” Toni says. “Then just stay where you are, okay?”

“Okay.”

He hangs up and looks outside. The view is indeed beautiful. He wishes he were in a situation when he could appreciate it more. But the only thing he can think about now is Toni.

He finds the bathroom and has a shower, and it finally makes him feel a bit better. He eats some of the biscuits Sergio bought for him, and makes himself some tea that he finds in one of the cupboards. He has another nap.

In the afternoon, he hears the sound of a car outside. He creeps to the door and peeks outside. Then he opens the door when he sees Toni, but has to grab the handle for support.

Toni looks terrible. Worse than when Lucas first saw him at the clinic. He just drags his body around, it can’t be even called walking anymore.

“Toni!” Lucas whispers when he sits him on the sofa. “We’ll go back, I’ll give you the blood, it’s alright!”

Toni shakes his head. “No.”

Lucas takes Toni’s hands in his. “It’s okay. I want it. I want to save you.”

“You can’t,” Toni says softly. “You can’t save me.”

“What do you mean?”

“Mutation,” Toni says. “The virus in my blood, it mutated. Your blood won’t work, it didn’t work in the hospital. That’s why they tried plasma, but…”

“But you got better!” Lucas objects.

“For a while. The virus found a way to kill the antibodies in your blood. No matter how much you give me, it will always destroy them. There’s nothing to be done.”

Lucas is looking at him, tears falling freely on their hands, but Toni can’t feel it anymore.

“You knew it when you let me go,” Lucas whispers.

“I would have let you go anyway,” Toni smiles. “I already had that plan before they told me.”

“So it was all for nothing,” Lucas says.

“No. I saved you. They would have killed you anyway, just to be safe. And I’m here, with you… It wasn’t for nothing.”

Lucas wipes off his tears furiously. “So what happens now?”

Toni smiles sadly. “Not much. I have to wait until it decides to kill me.”

“They couldn’t have just sent you off like this!”

“They gave me this,” Toni says and shows him a bag full of medicaments. “For the pain. That’s all they could have done.”

Lucas doesn’t know what to say to this. It feels so absurd, and so final, and he just can’t see past this moment.

“I brought some money,” Toni says. “You’ll take it and go somewhere they won’t find you. Just in case they are looking for you. Somewhere nobody knows you’re immune. You mustn’t let it happen to you again.”

“What about you?” Lucas asks. “You want me to just leave you here?”

“It doesn’t really matter now, Lucas,” Toni smiles wearily. “They said it would only take days. It will happen soon enough. Just go.”

“I have a different idea,” Lucas says, and grabs the bag of medicaments.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. You take this, and we’ll go outside, and I’ll hold you until…”

“Until it happens?”

Lucas looks him in the eyes. “Until you fall asleep, you morbid, death-obsessed idiot.”

Toni laughs and nods. “Sounds good to me.”

“And to me,” Lucas says.

“Just imagine I’d never have cut my finger,” Toni whispers.

“You wouldn’t die.”

“But I would have never met you,” Toni says.

“What a terrible idea,” Lucas says with pretended sarcasm.

“What a terrible idea,” Toni repeats with no sarcasm at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m so, so terribly sorry (no, I’m not, actually). I know you won’t entrust me with your babies ever again (or will ya?). But I have to say that they were perfect for this plot. Even more perfect than I imagined.


End file.
